Historic decision of Supreme Court of Israel which unanimously established that no legal framework allows the government to “grant total exemptions from military service to Orthodox students of religious schools”. According to the judges, therefore, the government cannot continue to instruct the army and the Ministry of Defense not to provide these provisions. A sentence that represents an epochal change in the relationship between the executive and the ultra-Orthodox population and which risks triggering tensions in the more religious neighborhoods, where the battle over exemption from the draft and the right to state subsidies has been going on for decades.
The Supreme Court’s decision represents another blow to the far-right government of Benjamin Netanyahu, characterized by the presence of ultra-religious groups opposed to the enlistment of Orthodox youth. A blow that becomes more serious if one takes into account that the judges have also established that the executive cannot “provide financial support to students of religious schools who study” instead of being drafted. The Court, however, did not go into detail about how, under the ruling, it would apply this law as it currently stands or how many Orthodox students could be enrolled. Currently the estimates are talking about approx 67 thousand young people.
However, the Movement for the Quality of Government, the main appellant to the Supreme Court on the issue of military service, rejoices, speaking of “a historic triumph of Rule of law and of the principle of equal burdens of military service”. The group thus asked the government and the Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallantto immediately proceed to the draft for Orthodox young people: “Discrimination in military service could not continue and the time for equality has arrived.”
